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2004-11-12 Bad Nauheim

reviewed by Andrea

I'm back from Bad Nauheim, and what can I say... what a fabulous end to a rather hard tour!

Frank and I started off from home in the afternoon. I was happy that he could come with me, as at first he didn't know if he could take the dayoff, so it was a last minute thing for him. This year I didn't have a hotel room and had to drive back through the night, so I thought he could drive home if I was too tired. Anyway, we weren't too lucky on the autobahn, as there was a huge traffic jam due to an accident, and we stood there endlessly, as it seemed, and I was afraid we would not make it to Bad Nauheim in time. But in the end we arrived at the Hotel Dolce at about 7 pm, so there was plenty of time to meet all the fanclub ladies. And it seemed, that in Bad Nauheim the whole German part of the fanclub was there ;-) So many familiar faces and a couple of new ones (to me). It was lovely and great fun!

I did already have a ticket for the front row, almost in the middle, and Frank managed to buy one for 2nd row, so we could not sit together, but we enjoyed it nevertheless.

The lads and Deirdre, as well as David and Karl, seemed so much more upbeat than they had been the time before! I was relieved to see they were feeling so much better!!! They were in good spirits and up for a great evening. And a great evening it was! They started off with County Down, followed by Caledonia. During Caledonia I thought, wow, this sounds different! I wondered, was it because they're feeling healthier, or was it the great acoustics, or both maybe, but I have rarely heard this song THAT powerful! As always, it is very special to me, but this time my happiness even doubled. Same goes for Mystic Lipstick, my 2nd favourite, which followed not much later. I couldn't do anything but sit in awe, and this feeling didn't leave me for the rest of the night. I think it was after Niall's - again - unbelievable rendition of Caruso, when I said to Anja (who was sitting next to me), "can we please have a live CD inluding all the solo's, so that we can play it for the next 35 years in repeat mode???" ;-) Indeed, that would be a wish of mine, those moments in concerts NEED to be captured in my opinion, so that we can all re- live them over and overagain (hint, hint...)

During the intermission I heard Patricia say to someone, that "The Prayer" was her new favourite. It's this lovely duet of Matthew and Deirdre, and I can only agree, this is another gem that they gave us.

As always I can't remember the set list, but it was mostly like the other shows, I think. All too soon it was overagain, and of course they got standing ovations. But the post-concert-blues had struck us all much earlier... is the tour already over? Nooooo... please stay a while longer!

James did his best again in the encore of Phil The Fluter! It's always such a great laugh and he does his dance in perfection by now, and this time with Marianne's support;-) Marianne, I think you can tell that story better! As for the fun on stage, there was plenty of it, they really gave us some good laughs. And not all of the jokes where part of the programme, I can tell you;-)

During our fanclub song Dein ist mein ganzes Herz the boys had a surprise for the audience this time. They entered the stage with their hands full of roses, began to sing, and during the song went off stage to give the roses to some people in the audience. I can tell you guys, youmade some ladies veryvery happy ;-)What a lovely idea!

When it was over, the lads, Deirdre, David and Karl got some presents from Anja, Ricky and Beate as a Thank You for another fantastic tour.

The meet-and-greet afterwards took place on stage this time and it took quite long. I went up there to tell them a huge Thank You for playing this last show, despite they were going through hard times before. They really gave their very best and I simply wanted to tell them it was highly appreciated.

At about 11.30 pm Frank and I started off to drive home, which turned out to be a bit of a dangerous trip. Once we were on the autobahn it started to rain heavily with strong winds and lots of aquaplaning.

Frank fell asleep next to me almost immediately, so I had to drive all the wayback (so much for my plan that he could take over, lol), and when we arrived home at about 2 am I was so very tired that I just dropped on my bed and went to dream-land straight away. When we started off I intended to write a review rightwhen I was home, but it was impossible. Now, in the morning, I woke up to a huge headache, I feel as if I had drunk a whole bottle of whisky all on my own, lol...but the trip down to Bad Nauheim was worth every second!

Please, James, Niall, Matthew, Deirde, David, Karl, come back soon!!!

As for pictures, as I forgot to take the camera from office which I wanted to borrow, I dug out my very old one (non-digital) and took some pictures after the show (during the show it wasn't allowed this time), which have to be developed now, but there were plenty of people taking pictures during the meet-and-greet, so I'm pretty sure there will be a folder full of memories up in the photo section very soon.

As this has been rather long now, I'll finish with the best wishes to the boys and and everyone else and have a great weekend